The politics of recount

Democratic candidate Stacey Abrams gives a speech to her supporters to refuse to award the victory to Republican Brian Kemp during an election night of the legislative elections in a hotel in Atlanta, Georgia (United States) on November 6, 2018. EFE/Tami Chappell.

The sequel to the mid-term elections has been the radical division of national opinion, evidenced in races that have reached the recount stage. Irregularities and vote suppression are the most urgent debates.

A week after the mid-term elections, several states and several races are at the limit of the dispute, with less than 1% in the margins of difference.

The whole country has closely followed the governor's election in Georgia, and those of governor and senator in Florida, where the risk of a radical change in the national political trend has put the president and his opponents on the edge of their seat.

According to Vox, Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) outlasts incumbent Bill Nelson (D) by 0.14 percent on the first count of the ballots. For his part, Rep. Ron DeSantis (R), who was declared the winner in the Florida governor’s race, is ahead of the mayor of Tallahassee, Andrew Gillum (D), with only 0.4 percent in the first counting

Likewise, the Secretary of State of Georgia, Brian Kemp (R), is ahead of the former leader of the state minority of the House of Representatives, Stacey Abrams (D), with 2 percent of the votes.

However, the situation in each of the states is different. The analysis of Vox points out that Brian Kemp has the advantage in Georgia since he’s the one in charge of the elections’ administration, and The Atlantic emphasized the trajectory of Kemp in trying to "purge" the votes in the state.

On the other hand, in Florida, the Republicans denounce an alleged "fraud" by the Democrats and have joined the presidential discourse that feeds conspiracy theories, according to the New York Times.

While what is really being discussed is the exercise of the will of the people through voting, U.S. politics has once again monopolized the discourse and deepened the polarization between blues and reds.

Even though federal judges have demanded the parties to "ramp down the rhetoric" when denouncing "illegal activities" in the recount, as happened in Florida, Democrats insist on fighting tooth and nail the remaining seats, while Republicans use all available ammunition to undermine democracy and the confidence of the people in the electoral process.

And this is just a historical flicker of what the country experienced 18 years ago thanks to the electoral recount in Florida during the presidential elections.

Again, the counties of Palm Beach and Broward are at the center of the dispute, between the crossfire of lawsuits and the evidence of political chaos in the country.

"Florida perfectly reflects the conflict emerging from an economic and social change in the United States," Keith Fitzgerald, a political science professor at the New College of Florida, told USA Today. "It just happens to be mathematically balanced. So it makes our elections dramatic. They’re partisan, and they’re really competitive."

Fitzgerald goes further and predicts that "the potential of a replay of this (in 2020) is high."

This time, and with the aggravation of the Democratic diversity in the ballots, the scenario is more complicated.

In both states African-American Democratic candidates compete for the first time in open opposition to the predominantly male and white format in Republican politics, and sentences such as that of Judge Leigh Martin May in Georgia (where he claimed that the Civil Rights Act had been violated), only show that in the United States of today, segregation and racism are still important tools when it comes to politics.